Express News Service
LUCKNOW: A team from the Unnao police took the two accused arrested in connection with the double murder and poisoning of three minor Dalit girls at Baburaha village earlier this week to the crime spot to recreate the incident after getting an eight-hour police remand from the CJM court on Friday.
Meanwhile, the lone survivor in the case was discharged from a hospital in Kanpur late on Friday. Villagers flocked to her home and gave her a rousing welcome in the village under Asoha police station area of Unnao.
The girl and her two cousins were poisoned by a local youth, Vinay, and his friend Sachin alias Raju on February 17. Her cousins died on the way to hospital the same day.
In order to corroborate the survivor’s statement with that of the two accused Vinay and Sachin arrested for the alleged crime, the police recreated the scene with the help of the duo. The police sources claimed that the accused showed them the spot where the victims had consumed the snacks and turned unconscious after drinking water spiked with the pesticide SulfoSulfuron, a poisonous substance, offered by Vinay.
The cops had got custody of the two accused for eight hours – from 9 am to 5 pm on Friday. “We used the time to recreate the crime scene to fill the gaps in the narrative of how the incident unfolded. We asked Vinay about the girls’ location before the incident and also how he reached them in the field where they had gone to fetch the fodder for the cattle. He was also asked how he pulled their bodies and dumped them after they fell unconscious by drinking the water laced with poison. All those questions were answered after recreation of the crime scene in the presence of the accused,” said a senior police officer.
Vinay allegedly reiterated that he wanted to kill only the girl he was having a one-sided affair with but the two other girls snatched the water bottle and consumed the spiked water. Co-accused Sachin claimed that he had no direct role in the crime. He said his only crime was to pass Vinay’s message to the three girls to come to the field for snacks on the fateful day. Later, the police took the two accused to the shop from where they had bought kurkure, other snacks and water bottle. The accused is yet to tell the police from where he had bought the poisonous substance.
However, Vinay did not reveal the exact source of the herbicide (poison), said SP Kulkarni, adding that sufficient evidence was there to nail the accused and a watertight case would be prepared after getting other reports from the forensic laboratory.
Meanwhile, after reaching her home on Friday, the lone survivor narrated the sequence of events to the mediapersons present there. “Vinay first offered us ‘namkeen’ and when we refused to take it, he gave us water to drink. First, my 13-year-old sister drank water, then the 15-year-old one and finally I also took it. Soon, we fainted,” the survivor said.